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Friday, December 6, 2013

Investment in soccer: A double-edged sword for Gulf states

Saudi Arabia has become the latest Gulf country to discover
that investment in European soccer to achieve national and corporate branding
risks reputational damage when potentially discriminatory government and
company policies are exposed.

With Qatar taking a public relations beating for the working
and living conditions of foreign labor involved in construction of
infrastructure related to its hosting of the 2022 World Cup, second tier German
soccer club FSV Frankfurt terminated a sponsorship agreement with state-owned
Saudi Arabian Airlines Saudia. Club spokeswoman Ann-Katrin Hautk said the agreement
had been terminated because the airline refuses to transport passengers who
carry Israeli passports. US critics have called for the barring of Saudia from
US airports.

It was not immediately clear how much the sponsorship deal that
involved placing a Saudi airlines model aircraft in Frankfurt’s Volksbank
Stadium was worth. FSV cancelled the agreement after German media accused the
airline of anti-Semitism and Frankfurt municipal officials and prominent German
Jews denounced it. “FSV is selling principles for cheap sponsorship money… Saudi-Arabia
is a dictatorship, Israel is a democracy in the Western sense,” Frankfurt daily
Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung quoted Michel Friedman, former deputy chairman
of the Central Committee of Jews in Germany, as saying.

Local bank and major FSV sponsor Frankfurter Volksbank and
FSV after which the club’s stadium is named said it was “irritated” by the
agreement with an airline that has discriminatory policies. The bank said it
finds any discriminatory policy unacceptable. Local politicians warned that
money was not a license to engage without consideration with any potential
sponsor.

Adding insult to injury, FSV announced the same day of the
cancellation a partnership with local club TuS Makkabi Frankfurt, a Jewish club
that is historically part of the centrist wing of the Zionist movement. Makkabi
president Alon Meyer said he had come to know FSV as “very sympathetic and
absolutely politically neutral.” He said that FSV stood for tolerance, openness
to the world and rejection of violence” and that he could “document that with
numerous steps” that the club had taken. Before FSV’s cancellation of the
agreement, Mr. Meyer warned” I now see FSV with different eyes.”

The Saudi airline is likely to find support for its policy
in much of the Muslim world but suffer reputational damage in other parts of
the world. Saudia risked widespread opposition to its deal even without its
refusal to transport Israeli passport holders given its reluctance to endorse
women’s rights to engage in sports and its human rights record.

Ironically, FSV exposed the policy at a time that the
kingdom has been more open than ever about the fact that it shares certain
interests with Israel. Saudi Arabia and Israel have spoken with one voice about
their opposition to last month’s first step by the United States and its fellow
United Nations Security Council members towards resolving the Iranian nuclear
crisis. Unofficial spokesmen for the kingdom have gone as far as suggesting that
Saudi Arabia would not refuse entry to the Israeli Air Force into its air space
should Israel decide to attack Iranian nuclear facilities.

The sponsorship agreement is the latest instance agreement
in which Gulf states turning to sports to enhance their soft power in a bid to
compensate for a lack of or insufficient hard power to independently defend
themselves have discovered that they run reputational risks that could
undermine the very purpose of the exercise. Qatar, despite taking some significant
steps to counter criticism of the working and living conditions of foreign
workers, who constitute a majority of the population, and engaging constructively
with major human rights and labor groups, has suffered significant damage to
its reputation. Few would want to come to the defense of a country that
rightfully or wrongfully stands accused of practicing modern slavery.

Bahrain in the last two years twice saw its efforts to
employ its sponsorship of a Formula 1 race to portray the country as having put
its brutally crushed 2011 popular uprising behind it and returned to normalcy
thwarted. Coverage of the races was dominated by reporting on mass
anti-government demonstrations.

Human rights groups this summer accused the United Arab
Emirates of seeking to launder its reputation with its high profile acquisition
of clubs like Manchester City, plans to establish a New York-based Major League
team, and soccer sponsorships. The criticism came as scores of dissidents were
sentenced to lengthy prison terms on charges of plotting to overthrow the
government in proceedings that failed to meet standards of fairness and justice
and UAE support for the military coup in Egypt that toppled Mohammed Morsi, the
country’s first democratically elected president.

Former English Football Association chairman Lord Triesman
has called for making a country’s human rights record one of the criteria for
establishing whether a state entity or member of a ruling family passes the
"fit and proper person test" for ownership of a Premier League club.
Similarly, criticism of Qatar has prompted a push to include human, labor,
gender and other rights in the criteria a potential host of a mega sporting
event should meet – standards none of the Gulf countries currently live up to.

James M. Dorsey
is a senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies,
co-director of the University of Würzburg’s Institute for Fan Culture, and the
author of The Turbulent World
of Middle East Soccer
blog and a forthcoming book with the same title.

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About Me

James M DorseyWelcome to The Turbulent World of Middle East Soccer by James M. Dorsey, a senior fellow at Nanyang Technological University’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies. Soccer in the Middle East and North Africa is played as much on as off the pitch. Stadiums are a symbol of the battle for political freedom; economic opportunity; ethnic, religious and national identity; and gender rights. Alongside the mosque, the stadium was until the Arab revolt erupted in late 2010 the only alternative public space for venting pent-up anger and frustration. It was the training ground in countries like Egypt and Tunisia where militant fans prepared for a day in which their organization and street battle experience would serve them in the showdown with autocratic rulers. Soccer has its own unique thrill – a high-stakes game of cat and mouse between militants and security forces and a struggle for a trophy grander than the FIFA World Cup: the future of a region. This blog explores the role of soccer at a time of transition from autocratic rule to a more open society. It also features James’s daily political comment on the region’s developments. Contact: incoherentblog@gmail.comView my complete profile